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Pieter C. van den Toorn, The Rite of Spring Briefly Revisited: Thoughts on Stravinsky’s Stratifications, the Psychology of Meter, and African Polyrhythm, Music Theory Spectrum, Volume 39, Issue 2, Fall 2017, Pages 158–181, https://doi.org/10.1093/mts/mtx015
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Abstract
Many of the dance movements of The Rite are stratifications, layered or polyrhythmic structures in which there is a superimposition of melodic fragments and rhythmic patterns that repeat according to varying cycles or spans. Another form of superimposition, stratification is static in its harmonic, registral, and instrumental implications. And so the question is posed: what accounts for the vitality of The Rite, the ability of this music to excite? Dynamic qualities in The Rite include the irregular accents and spans that mark off the repeats of fragments and chords, the displacement of these irregularly spaced repeats in relation to a steady pulse and meter, and the disruptions of the meter that are in turn brought about by displacement. I trace the physical impact of this invention to entrainment, the internalization of meter. The cognitive and biological implications of entrainment are discussed, including the evolutionary ones.
Stratification of the kind found in The Rite is without precedent in the art music of Russia and the West. I turn therefore to the polyrhythmic textures of African drumming, in particular, Gahu, a well-known dance of the Southern Ewe in West Africa. Made up of six layers of distinct rhythmic patterns, the cyclic, repetitive features of Gahu are useful as a means of setting both sides of this comparison in relief. I make reference here to the aesthetic and analytical commentary of Reich (1973), Locke (1987), and Agawu (2003).
